


When a Man is Lost

by clgfanfic



Category: Space: Above and Beyond
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-03
Updated: 2012-11-03
Packaged: 2017-11-17 15:29:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/553093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clgfanfic/pseuds/clgfanfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A missing scene from the Space: Above and Beyond episode "Stay with the Dead."</p>
            </blockquote>





	When a Man is Lost

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published in the zine Ouch! #6 and later in Black Ops #7 under the pen name Tara Mackenzies

"Colonel!" the doctor yelled.  "Colonel, this is _your_ problem now!  _You're_ the one who won't let go!"

McQueen stepped outside the operating theater, gesturing to two security guards he knew had been called when he pulled rank and put a stop to the physician's procedure.  His jaw muscles twitched as he held anger and hope in check.  "Get in there," he commanded the two guards in clipped, hard tones.  "Under no circumstances is Lieutenant West to be operated on.  Is that understood?  No operation.  No excuses.  I'll personally gut both of you if anything happens to that Marine.  Is that perfectly clear?"

The two young Marines drew themselves up.  "Yes, sir!" they barked.

"Good."  He turned, marching out of the ship's infirmary before the doctor could launch another salvo his direction. 

_I knew it.  I knew they weren't dead.  Why the hell didn't I listen?_

As he blustered down the passage crewmen scattered in his wake.  McQueen ignored them, mentally reviewing the events of the past three days.  The 58th had been sent in to extract the 61st.  West had contacted the _Saratoga_ , telling them everyone was dead -- the 58th and the 61st.  _Everyone.  Everyone but him._

The extraction squad found the bodies, if you could call the tangled, charred remains cradled in the uniforms of the 58th bodies.  And they found West: injured, incoherent.

There was no reason for anyone to believe that there were any survivors.  Not with West's transmission.  And not with the conditions of the corpses.

McQueen forced the monstrous images away.  He'd seen desecrated bodies before, but– _Damn the Chigs.  Damn them to whatever Hell they have._

Lots of soldiers had flashbacks.  He'd had flashbacks, horrible, tormenting, nearly debilitating flashbacks.  He'd thought he'd forgotten what those silent screams sounded like, but ever since West had woken up they'd been shrieking in his ears again.

Survivor's guilt was a natural, human reaction. 

A tight smile pulled McQueen's expression in the direction of demented.  _Human_ , he mused.  The word never rested comfortably on his tongue or in his thoughts for long.  _Tank_.  That term he was familiar with.  _Tank.  In-vitro.  Killing machine_. 

But his kids didn't see it that way.  To them he was Colonel T.C. McQueen, commander of the 58th, the Wild Cards, one of the most highly decorated units in the Chig War.  And, he hoped, he was also their priest, their father, and their best friend.

But he hadn't listened.  He'd let his own pain deafen him to the truth.

West had told him the 58th was alive, but he'd refused to hear it.  It was easier to accept that the mutilated remains he'd watched buried in space were his Marines.  It was easier to let them go back to the stars…   _So I didn't have to worry about them any more_.

He shook his head, mentally berating himself for taking the easy way out.  If they were dead, he didn't have to wait for the pain that always ripped through his guts while they played taps any more.

 _Why?_ he demanded of himself and whatever higher power watched over those of his kind.  In-vitros had no emotions.  They weren't made or trained that way.

But he felt things.

Not that he let on.  Only God knew what the higher-ups might think or do if they suspected that their grand experiment had started to feel.

But he did.  He felt a hell of a lot.  Anger that good Marines had been lost.  Grief.  Guilt.

And now?

 _Hope_ , he whispered to himself.  He was clinging to hope like a fraying tether on a space walk.  He wanted West to be right.  He wanted them to be alive.  Not just for West, but for himself as well.

He needed them to be alive if he was going to hold on to any shred of hope… any shred of belief that life, human or tank, was worth anything at all.

Tank.  They had been created to kill, and he'd spent his life doing just that.  And why?  Because he was trying to prove that In-vitros cared, that they wanted to help mankind, that they were worth caring about, worth granting rights to.

That he was a man.

McQueen reached the bridge and stopped at the admiral's station.  "I need an extraction."

"Ty?" the black man asked, looking up.  Concern folded over Ross's face in deep wrinkles.

Grey-blue eyes narrowed with determination and he leaned forward slightly, hoping Ross would sense his certainty.  "West's transmission, it was a diversion to throw the Chigs off their scent.  The 58th is still down there."

The older man's eyes widened slightly.  "Even if that's true it's been three days.  They're probably—"

"Sir," McQueen interrupted, "with all due respect.  My people are down there and I'd like to bring them home.  Now."

Ross studied the man for a moment, then nodded.  "All right, Colonel.  I'll clear a transport."

"Thank you, sir."

The admiral nodded and McQueen stepped purposefully over to the communication's station.  "Transmit an extraction point and time."

"Yes, sir," the young woman replied, already checking with the flight crew for the next possible departure.

"And at the end add the message 'stay with the dead.'"

"Sir?"

"Just do it," McQueen growled.

"Yes, sir."  The young woman turned her attention back to her equipment, checking for a clearance from the flight commander, then sending the requested transmission.  Location of pick-up, time of pick-up, and "stay with the dead."

She sat back and waited.  "Sir, I'm not getting a reply."

"Send it again."

"Yes, sir."  She hit the re-send and waited again.  "Sir—"

"I know.  Send it again."

"But—"

"Do it."  His tone was low, but the force of the words triggered her finger before she could think.

Another minute passed before the return message registered on her monitor. "Roger Wildcard extraction.  Tell Nathan we're coming home."  When McQueen said nothing, she glanced over her shoulder.  "Sir—?"

"I saw it," he interrupted.

The strangled tone of his voice and the light in his eyes told her exactly how he felt and the young woman grinned.  "Congratulations, sir," she whispered around the lump in her throat.

McQueen nodded, somber again.  Turning, he stalked off the bridge and started back for the infirmary.  The doctor would be livid, but that was his problem. The entire procedure was a travesty.  Destroying long-term memory to negate the effects of post-traumatic stress disorder was nothing more than theft.

Who survived the PTSD operation?  Not the soldier who suffered it to begin with.  That soldier forgot his past – home, parents, the war.  She couldn't remember her squadmates, the people who protected her back, the people he saw killed.  It was wrong.  There had to be another way, a way that honored the memories, the sacrifice… the dead.

 _But_ , the colonel thought, t _he doctor was right about one thing.  I_ don't _want to let go.  I've lost squads before, but there's something about these kids that's special.  I don't know why, but they are._

_And West, he's their… conscience._

_Yes, their conscience… and their faith._

He hit the infirmary doors, sending them swinging open like water before a prow.  The doctor stood behind the central monitoring station, looking decidedly pissed-off.  "Colonel," he snapped defiantly.  "I'm going to talk to the Admiral.  I'm going to have you up on charges—"

"West.  Where is he?"

"You can't play God, Colonel."

"I _am_ God when it comes to _my_ Marines, Doctor.  Where's West?"

"In his bed, sir," the nurse sitting at the station said, a slight smile on her lips.

"Thank you," McQueen replied, leaving the physician muttering to himself as he stepped around the corner.

West lay quiet, still.  _Unconscious_ , the colonel realized as he stopped at the foot of the bed, looking down at the young man.  He was finally relaxed, the worry and concern erased from the corners of his mouth and eyes.  He knew McQueen would get the 58th home, and that trust lit a warm fire in the bottom of the colonel's belly.

Moving to a chair next to the bed, he eased silently into it.  It was a habitual move and a location that had too rapidly grown familiar over the past three days.

He wanted to say something.  He wanted to tell West that the 58th were on their way home, but he wasn't sure how.  He wanted to tell the young man that faith had won, but he didn't know how to do that, either.  He combed his memory, looking for a story, a haiku, a poem…

He thought for a moment, trying to decide if he remembered all the words, then began to speak, quietly, surely, like a fisherman casting for a soul and praying out loud.

 

_…I heard it once_

_somewhere between the finite_

_mathematics of harmony_

_and the infinitely inescapable_

_possibilities of loneliness._

_Heard it, in the sad music_

_of solitary whales_

_in the North Atlantic_

_and recognized the voice_

_of my own soul_

_swimming also_

_in the dark_

_in the cold_

_under the implacable pull of the moon._

_When a man is lost_

_he returns to the last known thing._

_It is possible the same is true_

_for souls._

_I have rummaged, therefore,_

_through childhood_

_for the essence of my manhood_

_and the substance of my humanity._

_I have found only where the boy_

_was born – and where he learned_

_to trust and to love,_

_but since I am no longer he,_

_it becomes a vague exercise_

_like viewing the cosmos_

_through a kaleidoscope_

_(delightful, but without value.) **[1]**_

 

West opened his eyes.  "What's it like, sir?"

"What?" McQueen replied in a whisper as he stared at the floor.

"Not having a childhood?"

McQueen's lips twitched slightly.  He tipped his head up, meeting the young man's gaze.  "You can't miss what you've never had, West."

"Am I—?"

"You're fine.  No operation."

"I didn't think they did it.  I still remember.  Sometimes I think that's all I have left.  Just memories…"

"You have more than that."

West rolled his head to look away, but something in the silence made him turn and look directly at McQueen, silently asking the obvious question.

McQueen leaned forward, resting his forearms on the edge of the bed.  "You have faith.  And loyalty.  And courage."

West looked away again.  "I don't know…"

"I do."  McQueen stood.  "Come on.  They'll be here soon.  They'll want to see you."

The young man curled in slightly on himself.  "I don't know…"

"West."

The lieutenant glanced over his shoulder, fear and hope waltzing in his eyes.

"They'll need to see you.  And you need to see them.  It's not a dream."

Taking a deep breath, the young lieutenant forced himself to sit up, his legs dangling over the edge of the bed.  McQueen found a robe and eased it over the still-slim shoulders.  A wheelchair was next.

West stood and shifted into the chair, a cloak of dread and uncertainty wrapped securely around him.  McQueen knew there was nothing he could say that would help.  Only seeing the 58th alive would lift the desperation.

He pulled the chair back and maneuvered it around the bed.  With a push he started toward the squadron's quarters.

"Wait," West said as they passed through the infirmary doors.

"What?"

"The pictures," West said, his agitation climbing.

McQueen reached out and squeezed the young man's shoulder.  "I have them.  We'll stop and pick them up."

West nodded, trying to rein in his uncooperative emotions.  The last thing he wanted to do was cry, but so many feelings washed across his heart he had to force himself to breathe.

The colonel pushed off, rolling West to his own quarters.  They paused outside the door.  None of the 58th had dared to venture into his personal lair, but West wasn't raising any objections.

McQueen pressed his hand against the lock and the door slid open.  He rolled West in before the lieutenant realized where he really was.  Leaving West in his chair, McQueen walked over and picked up a box from his desk.  Turning, he almost smiled at the expression on the young man's face.  It wasn't at all what Nathan had expected.  Stark, yes, but McQueen was sure that the Oriental and African influences were a surprise.  He handed the box to West, who met his gaze, but didn't say anything.  He stepped behind the chair and pulled West back out into the hall.

As they neared the lieutenant's quarters McQueen slowed, giving West the time he needed to regain some control over his brittle emotions.

When West's fingers uncurled from the edges of the storage box, he rolled the chair up to the door.

"What was it?" the young man asked.

"It?" McQueen asked.

"What was it that made you believe me?"

McQueen paused, then answered truthfully, "I recognized the voice."

"What?"

"I recognized the truth in your voice."

"I don't understand."

"When you were talking about the girl, that was faith, but when you told me about the 58th, that was truth."

Without waiting for West to comment, he opened the door.  Inside, the survivors of the 58th were just beginning to understand where their personal pictures had gone.

He watched West straighten in his chair, ready to meet his fear, ready to prove to himself that his friends were really still alive.

_When a man is lost he returns to the last known thing – it is possible the same is true for souls._

  


* * *

[1]  Except from "The Last Patrol" in _Johnny's Song_ by Steve Mason.


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